Jonas Kaufmann

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio 4. For rights reasons the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:10

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.

Presenter0:34

My castaway this week is the opera singer Jonas Kaufmann, regarded as one of the world's foremost tenors. It's not just the outstanding beauty of his voice, but the authenticity of his characterizations and megawatt charisma that have critics and audiences around the world united in rapture. We should be thankful. He could have been working in insurance. Mathematics was his other great early skill, and indeed his father was keen for his only son to pursue the certainty of numbers rather than the unknown variables of life as a professional singer.

Presenter1:07

He saw his first opera aged just seven, and throughout his childhood loved being in choirs, surrounded by the music. He says I had professional singing lessons, and played the piano, but never with the intention of making it my profession. That was never the idea. It was just for joy. Do you still feel the joy?

Jonas Kaufmann1:26

I do, absolutely. And that was actually one of the key ingredients why I struggled at the beginning to choose the music path as my profession, because I was afraid that

Jonas Kaufmann1:37

Yeah, the moment it's my duty, I have to do it, I could lose all that passion and and joy and just see it as a burden. And that's why I didn't want to do it. But in the end it just shocked me so much that I I couldn't get rid of.

Presenter1:50

I wonder about the burden of expectation now. When you're standing in the wings, just before you go onstage, what's the feeling? Describe it to me.

Jonas Kaufmann1:58

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann1:59

Well, it's for me not very spectacular. I'm actually chatting with some friends in the wings and making fun, and when it's time I just walk out, I have n never had something like stage fright. Yes, at the very beginning I did. When I was still at school, I sang my first little solo things from Telemann or Bach, stuff like that. And of course, it was horrible for me to sing there in front of my classmates who found that absolutely embarrassing that someone of our age could be interested in such boring classical music. So that was really difficult for me. I was shaken all over. But the moment I, let's say, I learned how to sing and I knew that I have a reliable instrument, there's not much that could happen out there.

Speaker 22:31

Good.

Jonas Kaufmann2:47

I I wo became, yeah, what I am now. I'm uh one of those typical stage monsters that are just not afraid of anything.

Presenter2:55

Talking about pressure, we put you through the frankly the torture of choosing just a couple of minutes to play of each of these beautiful tracks that you've chosen today. I have to tell all of our devoted listeners, I have rarely had a castaway be so absolutely abject in his misery about us making you do that. It has been well, it's been made like putting thumb screws on you here too.

Jonas Kaufmann3:18

Absolutely. I mean, this is this is terribly painful, I have to say, because that it's only a couple of minutes and not even some excerpts from the beginning, the middle and the end, which the phrases that I love best but last

Presenter3:21

Yeah.

Presenter3:30

Just two minutes.

Jonas Kaufmann3:31

In it.

Presenter3:31

I know. That's really tough. And I should say, Jonas, you know, in our defense, it's worked for 73 years. We're not going to change it now, even for you. So tell me about this first track that we're going to hear.

Jonas Kaufmann3:39

So

Jonas Kaufmann3:42

Well, the first track is one of the many, many, many, many interpretations of the overture from the Fledermaus, The Bat, from Johan Strauss. It's a beautiful operetta, and this is my happy music. I mean, I think music is an extreme good mood setter. It has the key to our soul for some reason. And there are so many recordings out there from the Fledermaus, but there were only a few orchestras and conductors who combined the Viennese style with real passion. It's just brilliant. And the interpretation in this case is Carlos Kleiber, and he was one of the absolute greatest conductors of all times. And I think you can even hear it in these two minutes.

Presenter5:36

That was part of the overture to Straße's Der Fledemaus from the 1989 Vienna New Year's concert played by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Carlos Kleiber. Let's talk for a moment then, Janas Kaufen, about the the paradox of your profession, because, of course, you you must surely be to do what you're able to do, an artistic soul and a creative soul, and yet the industry that you are in of classical music requires that I'm guessing you'll know what you're doing this day in four years' time. Does it feel sometimes like a straitjacket to live that sort of life?

Jonas Kaufmann6:07

Well, absolutely. I mean, I'm I'm I'm in in the rare position now to to actually do something against it by just refusing to sign contracts five years in advance. You see, I always compare it to a painter and and you have to make him choose the colours that he's going to use for for the paintings that he will

Speaker 26:18

I really

Jonas Kaufmann6:28

Paint in five years' time. And they will all tell you, no way. I mean, who knows how I feel then? Because one of the most important ingredients of artistry is actually the spontaneity and the passion that comes from within. On the other hand, obviously, in a time of financial crisis, you can be very happy and thankful to have contracts for such a long period. But artistically speaking, it's a catastrophe.

Presenter6:52

What about the financial impact on audiences? Because of course, as much as many opera houses now have these programmes where they have a few cheap tickets, it's an expensive evening out. Does that concern you at all? Who you're reaching with your work?

Jonas Kaufmann7:06

Well, of course it does. I mean, it has to because I mean, we always need to build for the future. But there's so many cheaper tickets to have access to classical music and to opera, and still people hesitate to come. And

Jonas Kaufmann7:20

Those same people easily book tickets for the next movie, the the new blockbusters, and they also book tickets for the musical. And no one would think, well, do I know enough about this piece? They just want to see the show, they want to be entertained. And we as people involved in the opera business, we need to get access to these people and tell them.

Jonas Kaufmann7:43

It's the same story. We are also in the entertainment industry, and it's not necessary to know everything about it before you come. You don't need to read three books before you understand it.

Presenter7:54

Let's go to another tiny sliver of your music then.

Jonas Kaufmann7:56

Oh yeah.

Presenter7:58

Tell me about this second one. What are we going to hear now?

Jonas Kaufmann8:00

The second one is a song called Ombra di Nuba, and it's sung by Claudia Muzzio. I'm recording from 1935, and Claudia Muzzio.

Jonas Kaufmann8:09

At the time, she was considered to be one of the interpreters, not only from the classical repertoire, for instance, she was a very famous traviata, but especially from the so-called Verismo, meaning the music where it's all about passion and reality, actually. That's what Verismo is all about. But Muzzio, I might quote one of her colleagues, Giacomo Laurivolpi, and he said, This voice is just only tears and sighs, and that's exactly what passionate music and what Verismo is all about.

Speaker 29:04

We believe in the farmer.

Speaker 29:09

Will you be a home?

Presenter9:43

Shadow of a Cloud, sung by Claudia Muzzio. So tell me then, Jonas Kaupan, about your musical upbringing. What was the first music you remember hearing? Ooh.

Jonas Kaufmann9:53

I mean I was constantly surrounded by music because my my parents and grandparents they all loved classical music. They had a huge collection of LPs and tapes. So the first thing in the morning was to put on some music. It was quite heavy stuff also. We had Brokhner, we had Mahler, Wagner, Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff. So really very intense music, let's say. And loud.

Presenter10:19

And and both of your parents had left East Germany between the war and the wall going out. Tell me about your mother's family, first of all. What were the circumstances of them leaving?

Jonas Kaufmann10:25

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann10:30

At the time it was already of course not allowed to go there. It was only possible to travel to visit friends or to go to work. The police was looking all the time for families or people with bags and luggage that were possibly not just going for the day.

Presenter10:46

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann10:46

So that's why they split up and they all individually crossed on on different checkpoints to to the west and then gathered on on a meeting point in the west.

Presenter10:54

And so they travelled with nothing, essentially. They travelled with nothing, of course. And your father's uh journey uh as a youngster then out of East Germany. Tell me how he managed to fashion his his passage to Freedom.

Jonas Kaufmann10:56

They traveled with nothing, of course.

Jonas Kaufmann11:05

Yeah, he was um he had a friend that a classmate who was the son of an actor who was traveling every season to another theater, so his son had to swap to schools every now and then. And at the time then it was not allowed to travel anymore, only for very special occasions. And one of the occasions was being the best man for a wedding. So my father wrote him a postcard with a special code that they had made up years before, which meant invite me to your wedding. And that's what he did. So he sent a telex inviting him as his best man for his wedding, which was a fake, it was not non-existent. But he with that telex he could go to the authorities and say, listen, I just have to go for that weekend. And he left also everything. He left his parents behind. And they just came when the first grandchild was already there, my sister, because they had to wait for retirement until they were allowed to travel.

Presenter12:00

Let's have some more music, Jonas Kaufmann. We're on your third piece of the morning. Tell me about this.

Jonas Kaufmann12:05

Well, this is uh the introduction aria from the from Bach Goldberg variations, played by Gen Gold. He actually recorded it twice, once uh 1955. And until I was a student I loved it, and I I couldn't understand why someone would like his later uh interpretation, which is from nineteen eighty one, which is much slower.

Jonas Kaufmann12:28

And then suddenly things changed. And now I'm thrilled with it. I love it so much. Up to twenty, twenty-five years, everything that is great and bombastic and impressive and huge is what really gives the impact and what you really like. And then suddenly you tend to like the things where you, as a listener, actually

Jonas Kaufmann12:52

are involved in the process of understanding and adding your personal interpretation, your personal feelings, all that. And I love it so much.

Presenter14:14

Part of the aria from Bach-Goldberg variations played by Glenn Gould with Humming included their important team as well, you know.

Jonas Kaufmann14:20

Yes, exactly. I mean, he was very famous for that, but he's not the only one. It's quite fascinating to see how many musicians and conductors, for instance, can't stop themselves humming or making some kind of noise. And it's funny. Do you ever have to ask them to stop? Well, in a recording, it's quite difficult. I mean, the recordings that I did with piano are with Helmut Deutsch, and he hums a lot. He's very low. He always.

Jonas Kaufmann14:47

like that constantly. And some of the the operas or or aria recordings that I did were with Tony Papano, who is the hat of Covent Garden Opera, and he also can't stop it. So it's very difficult for the for the technicians. But I tell you what, the reason why

Jonas Kaufmann15:03

They can't stop is first because they're extremely passionate with it. They feel for each and every note, and there is so much.

Jonas Kaufmann15:13

Pressure and power inside that it just has to come out somehow. And that's why singing is so great because it is directly connected to our feelings. If we are sad, if we are happy, immediately it reflects in your voice. That's exactly what is so fascinating with singing, because we can use that by convincing ourselves that we are this other person, that these are our feelings, our words. And I love it.

Presenter15:39

When you were watching Madam Butterfly for the first time, aged seven, and you know it's it's a three-act opera, were you fidgeting or were you feeling it?

Jonas Kaufmann15:47

I was extremely fascinated. I mean, it's a funny story there because I remember we were sitting in the first raw orchestra stalls. You could see every detail, which for me was fascinating because I could almost touch the singers, and the sound was hugely, and I loved it. And I was.

Jonas Kaufmann16:05

Totally in shock when afterwards I mean, bear in mind, in my very first performance, I saw

Jonas Kaufmann16:11

that she reappeared for the curtain calls.

Jonas Kaufmann16:15

Because it just took away the whole illusion that she just committed suicide. And I said, why did they do that? I mean, I can't understand why. And my sister laughed and she said, I mean, come on. Couldn't you see her? She was sweating like hell, and the makeup was running down her face. It was disgusting. So you could see, I mean, it really, really got me there, and it just never let me go.

Presenter16:40

Let's go to the music then, Jonas Kaufmann. Uh we're on your fourth.

Jonas Kaufmann16:44

Oh, a very rare track. You see, I'm always asked about my Wagnerian interpretation, and I'm trying to somehow bring back the old traditions or break in with the habits of the idea that German music and also the German language is the language that can be sung and can be done legato and can be done beautiful. And that's something that scared me off from von Wagner for a long time, because I didn't want to end up singing like that. And I thought, listen, I mean, he was, first of all, he was a composer. He was, yes, also a text writer. But as a composer, the thing that is the most important is the tune, isn't it? So why would a composer destroy his best tunes by his own text? So it can only be secondary important. And if you can sing it in a legato and still make it understandable, then it's it's the best. And then it really struck me when I heard the first time Wagner sung in a foreign language. And one of the greatest French tenors of all times was Georges Tille. And we're going to hear a little excerpt from Wagner's Valkyrie, Ein Schwiertfahies Miderfate, which is in this translation, Oglev promie parmonperre. And listen to it, how beautiful it suddenly sounds.

Speaker 318:52

Uh

Speaker 318:55

The Son of God She Peyer.

Speaker 319:02

We'll be friendly, man. We don't feel

Presenter19:11

Oh, sword promised by my father from Wagner's Valkyrie, sung there by Georges Thiel in the French translation, accompanied by the Orchestra de la Société de Concerret de Conservatoire, conducted by Eugène Bigot. So maths and music, then, Jonas Kaufmann, those were the two things that you were very, very good at. Your grandfather was paying for you to have professional singing lessons, and you were also playing piano, but there came a point when you decided that you wanted to pursue music rather than maths. What was your father's response to that?

Jonas Kaufmann19:40

Uh well, he was worried. He was just worried that this uh so-called brotlousekunst, so the the breadless uh art, meaning no money involved, would lead me to maybe not poverty, but sadness, because he always told me, You are a family person, I know you want to start a family yourself. And uh it's true, I wanted to to live the life that my parents had lived, and therefore of course you need a a solid job, uh but I realized that being surrounded only by numbers and theories would be too dry and and nothing for me, and no contact with people and and or anything. I I didn't like it. I I wanted to perform, I think that was it.

Presenter20:25

And so you right, that's interesting. Did you like you like that element?'Cause not every performer does.

Jonas Kaufmann20:28

Not every performer does.

Presenter20:30

Still the same?

Jonas Kaufmann20:31

Well, it was you see, I was when I was a kid, my parents had lots of parties at the at their house, and I was always there joking with everybody and and telling jokes actually and little pantomimes and stuff like that. So I loved the idea that that you can entertain people.

Presenter20:47

So you are you a showolf by nature?

Jonas Kaufmann20:50

Probably, yeah.

Presenter20:51

That's

Presenter20:53

Nineteen eighty nine comes and you begin then to study music professionally in in Munich. And up until then, you know, you'd been in lots of choirs growing up. You loved this sensation I've read of of being in the music, of being surrounded by it. But at that time when you come to start studying it, does it all become a lot less joyous at that point?

Jonas Kaufmann21:03

True.

Speaker 221:03

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann21:09

Well, um you see it's it's quite ridiculous how how you start when you only officially study at the conservatory or something, because you get two lessons of singing per week, then you get two coachings per week. You have to have uh piano lessons, you have music theory, music history. But this this is easy stuff. But then, of course, I mean, I realized ultimately that singing

Jonas Kaufmann21:33

three times a week for an hour is not what you're you're getting paid for. So when I then first signed my Fest contract, you know, in Germany, they have this system of a stable ensemble. You're a member of the opera house, and that means you sing whatever comes along. Let's say, um

Jonas Kaufmann21:50

A stage rehearsal in the morning for one production, in the afternoon a coaching, and in the evening a performance. And the fact that I had to sing every day for six, seven, eight hours maybe not the most heaviest stuff, not the most difficult stuff, but I couldn't do it. I just couldn't do it. And and it it I it ended up in a huge crisis. I was about to to quit.

Presenter22:13

Like a cliffhanger. We're going to come back to that one, but for now, let's fit in some more music. We're on your fifth choice. What are we going to hear?

Jonas Kaufmann22:20

Oh, it's the Lied von der Eerde, the Song of the Earth. There is one song called Apschi the Farewell, and it's a recording that is for me certainly worth taking the entire piece on the island. In this case, I went for the song from the mezzo soprano, Krista Ludwig, also a fantastic singer. It's just divine, I have to tell you.

Speaker 322:55

Finish team ever

Presenter23:40

We heard Krista Ludwig with part of Farewell from Mahler's The Song of the Earth played by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Otto Klemperer. And if there were not enough people who are already jealous of the job I have, I should tell them that you sang along with that in the studio. I couldn't help myself, sorry. That could very strictly be termed a perk of a job for me, I think. So Jonas Kaufmann. You described then before we were listening to that beautiful piece of music this sort of, well, was it a vocal crisis that you had? Absolutely.

Jonas Kaufmann23:52

Yeah.

Speaker 223:56

The

Jonas Kaufmann23:57

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann24:05

Absolutely.

Presenter24:05

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann24:06

So how did you

Presenter24:06

So how did you dig yourself out?

Jonas Kaufmann24:08

Well, I f I found a new teacher, thank God. I mean, one of my colleagues there said to me, Listen, I mean, it's not your health that is in problem, it's actually your voice. And uh I'm sure you need a new teacher and he was right, and he was really my life saver, because without him I wouldn't have met Michael Rhodes, an American bariton from Brooklyn.

Jonas Kaufmann24:26

who lived in a small town in in Germany.

Jonas Kaufmann24:29

And I went to him, and it was magical because he changed radically everything. I changed the way of singing, and through that I suddenly got a round instrument, a dark instrument, a very reliable instrument, one that I could trust and I could sing on and on and on. It wouldn't get tired. So it was a dream come true.

Presenter24:50

It must be true, surely, that self-confidence and relaxation are an essential part of doing what you do well. But the pressure when you're a younger singer being offered these big roles of should I take it, am I ready for that? If I go and do it and I blow it, I'll never be offered that again. You know, all of those external pressures must be complex things to deal with. How did you navigate your way through?

Jonas Kaufmann25:13

Well, of course the pressure is always on. And you see, this is very, very difficult for a young

Jonas Kaufmann25:19

Musician

Jonas Kaufmann25:20

to say no to things where

Jonas Kaufmann25:23

It might be the chance of your lifetime.

Jonas Kaufmann25:27

But um it's the same thing like with auditions. Thank God I don't have to audition anymore. I hated it all the time. It's like when you invite a football player to to to the clubhouse, give him a ball and say show show us some tricks, and then hire him on that basis. No, you have to see him play because it's the whole package that counts. And at an audition when you appear and you're not in good shape.

Jonas Kaufmann25:52

This bad impression that you give there will never go away, so better no impression than a bad impression.

Jonas Kaufmann25:58

And when you get the chance to sing a great part in a great house and everything, but you think I'm just not ready for it because if I do it now, I might not be as good as I would be if I do it in two years' time. Then just don't do it. And this is very difficult to do. And I got lucky that I had maybe so much self-confidence that I thought, well, there will be another time. Tell me about your next choice. The next choice is a song from Die Schoene Müllerin from Franz Schubert. And this is a very rare interpretation of a Danish tenor called Axel Schütz. And I didn't know him until many, many years ago after a concert. An old lady came and gave me a tape and said, Can you listen to that and tell me whether you like it? It's the Schoene Müllerin sung by my husband, who passed away years and years ago. I think he was a great singer, and I was blown away by this interpretation. This is for me one of the most touching interpretations of Die Schoene Müllerin, sung impeccably German and with a beautiful voice. So listen for yourself. I find it really heartbreaking.

Speaker 327:07

Uh

Speaker 327:08

Wind my rosen hall rodund half face, Develken nicht feder austrist.

Speaker 327:34

Und green a lamorg sore wound for gone sore.

Presenter27:56

The Miller and the Brooke from Schubert's The Lovely Maid of the Mill sung there by Axil Schulz accompanied by Gerald Moore and I wouldn't dare do it in German given that I couldn't German

Jonas Kaufmann28:03

Could you terminate?

Presenter28:04

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann28:04

Sitting opposite me. How sh how would you say that? Oh, come on. It's uh it's very simple. De Müller unterbach. And uh that's the reason why they would never give me your job because I screwed up and I didn't didn't actually say which song it is. And they'd never give me yours. So I guess what?

Presenter28:15

And they never give

Presenter28:16

I guess we're equal on that one. With this extraordinary international schedule that you have, singing all over the world, you have three kids. Time to properly spend with them must be very precious. And how do you manage to schedule that in?

Jonas Kaufmann28:30

Well, that is extremely difficult, obviously. And uh it's a very time consuming job, it's true, and you can't do it from home, unfortunately. But of course we have the new medias. I mean they all got their phones now and we we we text and and we we Skype and and all these things. But I'm reading still reading them uh books. I have uh on my uh little iPad here I got all kinds of of books and and so I'm reading to them over the Internet because that's something that connects us.

Presenter29:00

Let's go to the music then, Junis Kaufmann. Tell me about your next choice.

Jonas Kaufmann29:03

Well, this is I'm a little bit ashamed to choose on Desert Island actually one of my songs. But I mean, since we're still in this frame, the song is called In Traum Hastdumie Alles Er Laupt, composed by Robert Stolz. Robert Stolz was an Austrian composer and he emigrated to the US. He would have been safe, but all his text writers were Jewish, and so many of his friends, and he was so embarrassed that he left the country. And we spoke before about whether in the crisis people would actually go to the opera. And I think one of the reasons why they go

Presenter29:09

Yeah.

Jonas Kaufmann29:41

is to be distracted and is to forget about their sorrows. And the reason why this song and many others written in these in the twenties and thirties are so persuasive and really pull you into this other world are because people were in misery and needed something to get distracted from.

Speaker 330:02

Quintur mask.

Speaker 330:16

Final Lady Loud

Speaker 330:48

Us to loved, usher loved, host and loved.

Presenter31:06

My castaway Jonas Kaufman singing In My Dream, You Let Me Do Everything. So, Jonas, um

Jonas Kaufmann31:12

Interesting text. No, it's it's actually meant exactly the way you you probably uh thought about it. It was a time where finally people started talking about relationships and and all kinds of things, not mentioning it like we do it now. Now as you know

Presenter31:28

So apart from just eight discs and and no uh MP three player to play them on, just these eight, and no gramophone player, you'll be on this island on your own, possibly for eternity. How do you think you'll cope being cast away?

Jonas Kaufmann31:42

Well, I don't know. I never tried. But many friends call me the fixer. I'm the one that, whenever something doesn't work anymore, they just come to me and I'll do it. Even my mother or my grandmother, they would always pile up things there and say, you know what? For some reason, the dishwasher doesn't do it when I push this program. And I'm traveling with a little toolbox everywhere. Because when I come to an apartment, which happens very often, that I have to rent, the first thing is because I can't stand things that don't work. So I start fixing things. So I think that I come along quite well there.

Presenter32:14

Yeah.

Presenter32:15

I have to tell you, you had millions of female fans before. You just doubled your c

Presenter32:23

A man who can sing like that and fix the dishwasher. What more could we ask for? Right, it's time for your eighth piece of music, then. Tell me what we're going to hear.

Jonas Kaufmann32:31

Well, the last piece is Ritz Wunderlich, one of my great idols, I have to say. He always gives you the impression that it might be the last phrase of his life. So he squeezes as many emotions, as many passion, as much passion into it as possible. And I think none of his songs or his recordings shows this more

Jonas Kaufmann32:55

Then the beginning of Granada, a Spanish melody by Augustin Lara, and this is one of the songs that that just kill me when I hear it.

Speaker 333:05

And he'd run up

Speaker 333:32

El Granada

Speaker 333:37

The reaper was the heartburn by Klunger di Tara.

Speaker 333:43

And you could run out of

Speaker 333:49

Of mere love to the eye, but spanned wine in Los Angeles.

Speaker 333:57

Ich Holters, I say Jon Fangen, who seek my heis for language, Das Brenden and the Lord.

Presenter34:12

Yeah.

Speaker 334:12

Uh

Presenter34:12

Passive.

Speaker 334:12

Yeah.

Presenter34:12

Granada, composed by Augustine Lara, sung by Fritz Vunderlich, accompanied there by the Granca Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Hans Karsta. So, Jonas Kaufmann, we give people books, we give them for this island, the complete works of Shakespeare and the Bible, and you get to take one other book. What's your other book going to be?

Jonas Kaufmann34:28

The guy is called Karl Amory, and the book is called Das Kunigsprojekt, so the Royal Project. It's a very funny book. I just love that story.

Presenter34:38

Okay, we shall give you that book then. And you're allowed one luxury as well, Yanas. What's that going to be?

Jonas Kaufmann34:38

We shall

Jonas Kaufmann34:40

And so

Jonas Kaufmann34:44

My obvious guess would be a coffee machine, because without coffee, I mean, life is not half as worthy. Okay. We'll even give you a cup to go with coffee.

Presenter34:52

Yeah.

Speaker 234:52

Uh

Presenter34:52

And if you had to pick just one of these eight to save from the waves.

Jonas Kaufmann34:53

And if

Jonas Kaufmann34:57

Oh god.

Presenter34:58

Yes, I know that's a good idea.

Jonas Kaufmann34:58

That is very, very difficult. I would say probably the the one that fits the best to the environment of an island is Granada. Hopefully it's an island not somewhere uh close to Iceland or or inland. I think it's Peninsula. It's warm, okay, so then it's Granada.

Presenter35:10

No, it's I think it's pretty good.

Presenter35:13

Okay, the Bunde is yours then. Ms. Kaufmann, thank you very much for letting us hear your desert island discs. Oh, you're most welcome.

Jonas Kaufmann35:13

Okay, but wouldn't that be

Jonas Kaufmann35:15

Yeah.

Presenter36:00

You've been listening to a download from the BBC. You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website: bbc.co.uk slash Radio4.

Speaker 236:14

Uh